Unlocking Regional Memory

A New South Wales Regional Archives Electronic Archival Network

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Introduction - about the project

In early 2002 the Australian Research Council provided funding to
the Principal Investigators, Professors Jim Hagan and Andrew Wells of
the University of Wollongong, to conduct a pilot project to investigate
the feasibility of producing an Internet gateway to regional archives
in New South Wales, along with a methodology to digitise documents and
view those documents online.

The pilot project sought to develop a detailed, uniform and
cross-referenced web-based electronic inventory of the regional
archives of New South Wales using proven software. In addition, the
pilot project was to test the digitisation of collections, and the
linking of these digitised collections to the participating regional
archives' online inventories. The archival records considered to fall
within the scope of the project were the collected archives in the
custody of the participating archives. University and other public
records held were not considered, as these are the subject of a
separate cataloguing project funded by State Records New South Wales.

To achieve the aims of the project the project team has developed:

a website that provides summary information on the archives in
the custody of the participating archives;

an exemplar of linking inventories with digital copies of
archives;

an approach to digitising records and accessing those images
within the constraints existing at the participating archives.

Website with summary information

The website provides summary information about the collections in
each of the four regional archives in New South Wales - University of
New England, the University of Newcastle, Charles Sturt University and
the University of Wollongong. The summaries are linked to:

where appropriate, the custodial archive's online inventory or
catalogue;

information
(where known) on the records' creators. Relationships between creators
have also been incorporated with this data; and

other potentially useful resources. It should be noted that these
links are not comprehensive. Those that have been included are
indicative of what can be achieved to enhance the value of information
produced from the technology being employed.

Using the Browse function

The "Browse" function is similar to a book index in that it guides
the user to entities represented in the Regional Archives Collections
either alphabetically by name or alphabetically by name under an entity
type, like "Pastoral Stations". Example: Go to the Browse page and look for "People", select "D".
Open the entry for "Dangar,
Albert Augustus". This entry provides a short biography of Dangar. It
also provides links to archival and published resources associated with
him. You can also find this same entry by going to "D" on the browse
bar across the upper part of the screen where all entities irrespective
of type can be found alphabetically by name.

Entity Type Descriptions:

Community Group

Concept

Corporate Body

Cultural Artefact

Employer Body

Event

Family

Health Body

Language

Natural Phenomenon

Organisation

Pastoral Station

Person

Place

Political Party

Professional Assoc

Religious Body

Special Collection

Sporting Body

Trade Union

Welfare Body

About Archival and Heritage Sources and Published Sources

The "Archival and Heritage Sources" link takes the user to
information on the location of the archives (in the case of Dangar, the
University of New England and Regional Archives, Heritage Centre);
there is also a link to the entry for the archive in the Online
Directory
of Archives in Australia (repository details). Summary
information on the archival records held in the archive and the overall
date range of the records is provided. A link to the regional archive's
online catalogue is achieved through the "Reference" number, e.g. the
University of New England reference number. Other links are provided to
related entries e.g. Henry Dangar and the Dangar Family. These links
could be to other collections in another regional repository. e.g.
Dangar at the University of Newcastle Archives. An example of extensive
related links can be found in the entry for Anglican Diocese of Newcastle. These
links are to other parts of the Diocese and to people.

The University of New Engalnd have taken the information a step further by
including Accession Lists to entities. These can be found as Digital Objects on
the naviagtion bar. See William Tyrrell (1807 - 1879)
as an example.

The "Published Resources" entry gives bibliographic details of the
Dangar entry in the Australian Dictionary of Biography.
When this entry is used it may capture histories, biographies or other
relevant published resources in both conventional printed forms or in
online formats. Where an entry is to an online resource there is a link
to the relevant resource: see the entry for Gormly, James (1836-1922) as an example.

A hidden benefit of the "Published Resources" database is that the Armidale
and District Historical Society. Journal and Proceedings has been
included from Volume 1 (1961) up to Volume 44 (2001). This data can be
searched using the "Bibliography" search on the Search
Page. The University of New England Archives provided this data
from the publication Armidale and District Historical Society.
Journal and Proceedings. Guide to Contents Volume 1 to 44,
Compilers Bruce Cady and Graham Wilson, published by the Society in
2001.

Exemplar linking inventories with digital copies of archives

Currently the four regional archives use different approaches to
publishing information on their respective collections to the web. In
each case the level of adherence to accepted archival principles
varies, as does the depth of information provided.

In an ideal world each archive would use a recognised archival
database system and have the capacity to publish detailed information
on each collection from that database to the web. If this were the case
a uniform approach to the digitisation of documents and then the
accessing of digital documents could be achieved.

The Australian Science and Technology Heritage Centre (Austehc)
which forms part of the project team has developed such an approach
using their free archival management tool, the Heritage Documentation
Management System
or HDMS. Austehc have developed a digital document viewer that is
linked to the HDMS to provide a delivery mechanism for digital
documents that are in collections documented in the HDMS.

Detailed information on the Brown family and their archives is
presented. By going to the Series
entries a list of archive series is provided. This includes information
on the different series and their respective data ranges. To the right
of each series entry there is a link, Image.
This takes you to the digitised images of documents that comprise each
series. For example: to Series 5 Photographs, item 5-1 Brown Family -
Photographs, "Envelope inscribed 'Brown Family', containing: 42
photographs of Gilbert, Marie and Ian Brown and members of their
families, some labelled."

The viewer allows you to view a thumbnail of each document and to
move through each of these sequentially. If a larger view of an image
is required check the "enlarge" button. It is also possible to select
images by use of the drop-down menu. This assumes that the image number
is known or that the user wants to jump through the image collection to
sample a range of images.

Accessing images within the constraints existing at the
participating archives

Currently the participating regional archives have different
approaches to publishing information about their collections
on the web. The only satisfactory way of dealing with this is for each
of the regional archives to place a marker on each entry in their
catalogue for each set of digitised documents. There would then be a
link from that marker to a viewer (as above) for viewing the digitised
documents.

There are 14 examples that demonstrate how this has been achieved in
this project:
University of Wollongong Archives:

Copyright

The participating Universities manage the intellectual property
rights for their images on this site. Researchers wanting further
information and/or copies of images should contact the respective
University archive.

Obtaining Copies of images

Each of the Universities paricipating in this project manage the
reproduction and charging for copies of images. Researchers wishing
to obtain copies of images of records should contact the respective
Univesity archive for advice on that university's fees and charges,
ordering procedures and copyright policy.

Acknowledgements

The project team is to be congratulated for their work in drawing
together the resources required to bring this project to completion.

The project team comprised: Bruce Smith (Project Manager), Sophie
Patrick, Jim Crowley, Ailie Smith. The Austehc team, or more correctly,
staff of the Australian Science and Technology Heritage Centre,
University of Melbourne, Gavan McCarthy (Director), Joanne Evans, Helen
Morgan, Ailie Smith and Alan van den Bosch provided support for the Online Heritage
Resource Manager
(OHRM) and developed the imaging processing and viewing software. The
Austehc team also assisted the project team in many other ways.

Map credit (the map used on the home page and
throughout the website as a logo):
Map of New South Wales as occupied
by The Native Tribes. Prepared by Dr John Fraser. Published in An
Australian language as spoken by the Awabakal, the people of Awaba or
Lake Macquarie (near Newcastle, New South Wales) being an account of
their language, traditions and customs by L.E. Threlkeld; re-arranged,
condensed and edited with an appendix by John Fraser. Sydney: Charles
Potter, Govt. Printer, 1892.
Courtesy of the Archives Rare Books and
Special Collections, Auchmuty Library, University of Newcastle.